Category Archives: Writing

I used to fancy myself a poet, once upon a time. However, I never had much love for haikus. These syllable based poems used to drive me crazy, as they were, in my mind, too structured and forced to be short to be of much use in expressing myself. However, the newest weekly challenge has set a new goal for me… overcome this hatred for the 17 syllable haiku, and bust out five of them. Ready for my first haikus? Here they are…

Creamy mild flavor,

Fun to play with when eating

swiss cheese is so good!

(HA! Take that, G.K. Chesterton)

Cold air bites my skin

Visable breath in small puffs

November is here

Laundry all around,

Dishes need to get done too

So many chores to do

Bills are owed, need paid,

Rent is due, car payment, too

Off to work I go.

Kids aren’t babies now,

But not grown to teenager.

Slow down and enjoy!

Nope, still not fond of haikus, but glad I gave it a shot. I know there’s two weekly challenges written by me. The earlier post is from last week’s challenge, but I didn’t notice that before I wrote it, so you get two today. Enjoy.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, my mother, Lee Ann, passed away about a week ago. I’d written about her before, but came across a weekly writing challenge called “Traces” in which we are challenged to write about leaving our mark on the world, and she’s the first person I thought of when regarding this challenge.

When reflecting upon my mother, of course there are fond memories, there are not so fond ones, too. My mother was not a saint… far from it in fact, but I loved her even more for all her misgivings. She was raised in California, dirt poor, in the 1950’s and 60’s. She had two older half brothers and one younger sister. She didn’t like to tell me stories about the things she did when she was young very often, but I know she was picked on, hated her own image, and made some rather poor choices in husbands early on.

When I tell other people about my mother, I don’t sugar coat a thing. She was honest, and so too am I. Her honesty could hurt sometimes, and maybe she wasn’t always transparent with everyone, but she was with me. When my sisters and I reminisce of her, we don’t talk about that trip we took or that time she was so nice… we tell stories about how people stared in horror as she yelled at us in a Mc Donald’s play place to get down or she’d “rip our arms off and beat us over the head with it”.

So why am I writing about my mother in a challenge about leaving my mark on the world? Well, I’m pretty certain that I’m (one of) her marks on the world. Sure, she made some awesome stuff that will still be around, now that she’s gone. She met lots of people, even took some of them in and cared for them when they were down. Those people will remember her and what she did, too. But I (and my siblings) are the result of her molding. Her mindset; brought to life. I am the product of her lifestyle, choices, personality… her everything. I am her mark on the world, and so too my children will be, after I’ve had more time to mess with their little minds and mold them into my little clones.

I am not my mother’s twin, but I carry a lot of her with me. We had the same hair, the same laugh, and the same pace and tone when speaking. People mistake me for her on the phone. Her views and mine were like night and day on some topics, and on ones we agreed on, we’d still debate the same side. She wasn’t the most understanding of what I thought, and nor I of her. She and I weren’t physically affectionate either. Honestly, I should have hugged her more. My mother loved the crap out of me though. I know she was proud of me, she said so often.

Now that she’s gone, her legacy is what she made. She made tons of objects, like dog agility equipment, painted rocks, polished rocks, paintings, blankets, and shadow boxes. However, it was the life she made herself, and those who gravitated towards it, that are her true legacy. I am who and what I am because of her, and I know she altered other lives outside our family, too. She was naturally nurturing, and people always just found her. Her legacy is her story, and now that she isn’t here to tell it, I suppose I should someday.

I hope someday I have impressed upon my children the importance of legacy; of family, and how they are my mark on the world. I’ve learned from my mother’s shortcomings and try not to have the same ones, but I’m sure the ones I do have will be remembered by my children. Someday, when they talk about legacy, I hope they think of me, I hope they know that THEY are MY mark on this world… and pass that on to their children. My story, my legacy, my mark on the world, is family.

More than a year has gone by since I opened my mouth last… perhaps that’s a good thing. Rather than apologize, I saw a quote while looking up ideas on how to write about the passage of time and came across this little bit of pleasure…

Sometimes I need what only you can provide: your absence

It made me think that apologizing to the internet for not having time for it is rather silly, since odds are, no one noticed I wasn’t writing. As depressing as that thought might seem, it doesn’t bother me. I don’t write here for any other person’s pleasure, just my own. It’s a nice little journal of sorts that I am willing to share, and if someone is willing to read, all the better.

So I’ll try to recap the last year as briefly as possible… mostly so I can remember to write about these events later.

We spent Christmas last year in Bremerton with family, for the first time in 10 years.

In January I promised myself to be healthier… and I promise I tried… for about a week.

In February I got a job at Burger King… In April I quit. Don’t work there. Just don’t.

April brought Lillie’s 6th birthday.

In late April I started working for The Home Depot. Do work there. I still do.

In June Hayden turned 10. Double digits earned him a trip to a water park. Turns out I don’t care for water slides… or find I feel too fat for them. See January.

Also in June I joined a gym. That lasted a month due to cost… but I lost weight.

In July my mom found out she had cancer. I spent a week or so in the hospital with her.

In August I decided the weight had to go. Between August and November I lost like 30 lbs.

In September both kids were in full time school. I wish they’d quit getting older, cause that means I am too.

In October I turned 29, Mom turned 59, Dustin turned 38, Molly turned 19, and I had my 11th wedding anniversary. I also worked too much, and didn’t celebrate much, but I did get an awesome 3DSXL and Animal Crossing for a present!

For my anniversary, though, I went to a Navy League Ball. It was fancy… and boring. But I got to wear an expensive dress.

For Halloween, Hayden was a Creeper, and Lillie was the Pink Power Ranger. Also, Bill visited.

November 6th was Garen’s birthday. He’s still old. (33)

On November 11th I arrived at Harrison Hospital at 3:30 in the morning, for my mother.

On November 13th I got to talk to her for the last time.

On November 16th, she passed away. (Also Garen’s late mother Charlet’s birthday)

On November 22nd, my sister in law Gina was being a sneak and got eloped. (CONGRATS!)

Tonight I redid the blog, merged in older posts, and got ready to try writing again.

I make no promises to commit to writing, because I never seem to follow through. But I’ve got the bug, because my hubby got the bug… and well, anything he can do I can do better! (Not really, he’s got a knack for words).

I’ll try to expand upon these things in the next few days… but there’s the short version.

Sure, why not? I keep thinking I enjoy writing… I just never seem to stick to it. I considered other names for this blog that gave off a sense of constantly starting over, some depressive sounding names, some inspiring ones, I even considered calling it blah blah blah assuming no one is really going to read it other than me, and maybe Garen. Usually having a specific topic in mind and sticking to it is helpful in blogging. It helps to build and audience and it helps you to spur along in writing about said topic you love. Previously, I’d tried to do that with Altoholics R Us and it’s predecessor AltoholicMom… They were rather successful, but a hacker that wouldn’t quit sort of put the damper on my drive to continue writing them.

Before that I’d attempted to write about my life in general, several times over. Every single time I’d find myself looking over a post and thinking, geez… no one really wants to read that… and then gave up on it again. This time I still intend to write a bit about my life, but maybe more specifically into the things I do, like crafting and couponing and work, rather than how adorable the kids are and how I wanna strangle them some days. (Even as I write this they are terrorizing a box I had an intention of using to send rather late Christmas presents).

One of my worst personality traits is that I tend to not finish what I start… or I start it over again and again… each time hoping that this time will go better than the last. I am constantly doing-over things I’ve already done… mostly because I can’t do things perfectly on the first shot… but then again, who really can? Perfectionist Fallacy was another name I considered for this blog. Sometimes I feel like I want to call out “DO OVER!” on my entire life, but then I come to my senses and realize things could be much much worse.

This time around on my blog do-over I have no set direction, I have no specific topic.

I hope to develop the intention of this blog as I go. I hope that those who have the misfortune of stumbling across it get the occasional joy out of reading the rambling that pours out of my head on a daily basis… but mostly, I hope this stops that nagging feeling I get that makes me light a fire under my ass to create endless amounts of blogs out there…

Regardless, until next time…

Andrea

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Would that apply to a dog, too? Does a dog still smell like a dog regardless of what you name it? Of course it does, but that doesn’t mean I want to be heard shouting “Sir Snuffles McBeth Von Schnauzer Fluffypants the Third” every time I call the dog. I recently posted on Facebook for suggestions on what to name our soon to be addition to our family, but instead got a lot of reasons that I shouldn’t own a new puppy right now. Granted, there were a couple names suggested among my friends and family, but thus far, the names my family likes I’ve found myself. Here’s a list of what we’ve got so far.

There are other names we liked but those are the top ones thus far. Garen has a few other choices in mind like Thor and Odin… but I’m really not digging on those. We’ll have to meet our new pup first, and then decide upon a name suiting of his/her personality, and of course of his/her being a German Shepherd. So it’s not too late to throw out your .02 cents on this issue, if you’ve got an opinion on naming it, that is. On owning it, well that’s a mute point now, it’s already paid for.

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Ok, so maybe you get it, with the titles and such? Or maybe you don’t. Just in case you don’t (don’t feel badly, Garen apparently missed the reference as well) the title of the blog and the title of this post are in relation to the TV show Friends, which used the “The One With…” format for every episode. I don’t actually intend to label all my posts this way, but I liked the idea for the title of the blog… and hey, it’s always a nice fall back when I can’t come up with a clever title on my own for future posts.

So yup, a blog… on blogger… which is different than my previous wordpress attempts… and there have been many. This time around there’s no just WoW, no just poems, no just “the kids drove me nuts today”. I plan to simply post whatever crops up to my mind. Somedays it might be mindless complaining, other days, I might have an actual well formed opinion on something to share. Or maybe my kids were doing that cute thing again. Who knows? We’ll see what I come up with. Otherwise, welcome. Make yourself at home. My life is pretty crazy so I hope you’ll stay open minded with me here.

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Well readers, update your URLs and your RSS feeds! Altoholics R Us have officially moved to a brand new home, because, well, it was time to self host! Along with the move comes the introduction of a brand new author, and a suprise announcment. Make sure you don’t miss out on the fun!